one last post for David

I am so tired, I just put sugar in my tea (I drink my coffee with sugar, my tea without).

David Honisgberg's (dochyel) funeral was yesterday and it was a beautiful thing, if you can say that about a funeral -- full of memories, tears, and laughter. A lot of laughter, and none of it stiffled or uncomfortable. The hill where he rests has a full dose of sunlight, which he would have appreciated, and the cemetary is filled with enough odd structures and painful but lovely headstones to make me remember Peter Beagle's A FINE AND PRIVATE PLACE, one of my favorite books.

As always when old and scattered friends return for an emotional event there was a lot of "oh, we must..." I suspect we won't, but I'd like to be wrong. I think David would like that. And I find myself thinking of David in the present tense -- not because I haven't accepted that he is gone, but rather because I honestly don't think he is. I very much felt his presence yesterday, and it was like his hug, all over again. I didn't always understand his actions or his decisions, but he was my friend, my rabbi, and I love him very much.

After, while others went back to the park (Alexandra's apartment being too small for the unsurprisingly large crowd), I and some friends went off to grab lunch and our own quieter memories.

And then, in a very New York moment, I decided to leave my car where it was (a PERFECT parking spot) and grabbed a ride across town to my parents' place, rather than drive across town and have to look for another spot. I'll pick the car up later today after brunch with a friend and a shiva visit, when I'm back on that side of town.

And then I will be home, and staring down the barrel of some significant deadlines. Shark on the starboard bow!